When USA Hockey announced its Olympic men's hockey team on national television on New Year's Day, young players skated into view wearing a jersey with the name of each player.

A college defenseman from Westport watched it along with hockey fans around the country. And sure, it was in the back of his mind that someday one of those kids could be wearing "Paliotta."

"I think it's every kid's dream, aspiration to play in the Olympics," said Michael Paliotta, a junior at Vermont.

"You see how many great players were left off the USA, Canadian teams. It's so, so tough."

Paliotta has a lot in common with a lot of those guys, though.

Three players on the U.S. men's team have Connecticut roots, goalie Jon Quick (Milford and Hamden), defenseman Kevin Shattenkirk (born in Greenwich, played at Brunswick) and forward Max Pacioretty (New Canaan).

"Quick, Pacioretty ... Shattenkirk, those three guys: A forward, a defenseman, a goalie," said Ryan Haggerty of Stamford, a junior forward at RPI who's a nominee for this year's Hobey Baker Award.

"It shows it's not just a lucky guy here and there. They're three real high-end NHL players. There are multiple guys throughout the Northeast playing in the NHL."

The state has been represented on the men's team at every Olympics since 1988, when there were also three state-tied players: Hartford-born Greg Brown and Craig Janney, plus Cheshire-raised Brian Leetch.

Since then, the sport has grown in numerous ways. This year's three men's Olympians grew up playing for Mid-Fairfield's youth program.

Julie Chu of Fairfield, playing in her fourth Olympics for the women's national team, grew up at the Wonderland of Ice. Branford's Caitlin Cahow, a two-time Olympian, isn't playing but is part of the nation's delegation at the games; three members of the 1998 gold-medal women's team were from Connecticut, including New Canaan's A.J. Mleczko and Greenwich's Sue Merz.

Programs have sprouted at all levels around the country, including junior teams like Norwalk's Connecticut Oilers.

"When we won the national championship, there was one team," Boguniecki said. `You made the travel team, or you played house league. Now there are five different travel teams at every level. I look at it as a good thing. Good hockey continues to grow all over."

That's the thing: Hockey in the United States has grown to where this year's 25-man Olympic roster is missing a traditional hotbed, Massachusetts, and there's not really a blink.

There are eight from Minnesota, the team's traditional cradle. But there are also six from New York (mostly upstate, but also including Shattenkirk, whose given hometown is New Rochelle, N.Y., where he grew up), three apiece from Wisconsin and Michigan, and two from New Jersey.

But there's a bit of a rising tide around the country, too. Part of it comes from the program that helped nurture Haggerty and Paliotta.

USA Hockey began the National Team Development Program in 1996 in Ann Arbor, Mich., drawing 16- and 17-year-olds from around the country to train together. The U.S., which hadn't won a World Junior Championship since the tournament began in 1976, has won three times since 2004.

"As soon as you get there, they make it pretty clear you're there to win," said Paliotta, a 2011 draft pick of the Chicago Blackhawks. "Your first year might be a development year, but you're playing other countries, tournaments: You're there to represent the United States and win gold."

And those Fairfield County guys did, both years, winning world championships and an assortment of international tournaments.

The NTDP alumni list in the media guide includes over 450 players (including nine of this year's Olympians, Shattenkirk among them) with hometowns in 34 states plus Washington, D.C.; from Mesa, Ariz., and Flower Mound, Texas; from Canyon Country, Calif.; and Winter Park, Fla.

The list includes 10 players from Connecticut (not counting New Rochelle's Shattenkirk), most recently Greenwich's John Hayden, who's now at Yale. The most notable are probably Greenwich native/Canadian-raised Colin Wilson, who's now with the Nashville Predators; and Bolton's Ron Hainsey, a veteran of over 600 NHL games.

Just Saturday in Dmitrov, Russia, the U.S. Under-18 team won the Five Nations Tournament.

"It was a great opportunity to play multiple times a year overseas against other countries," Haggerty said, and the experience has helped him as he moved on to college hockey, the intensity of tournaments in which one game could be the difference between winning the whole thing or going home early.

"The big thing I took away is how important it is to represent your country," Haggerty added. "It's one of the highest honors in any sport. You play against Sweden, play against Canada, play against Russia: It's going to be very intense and emotional."

They've seen that type of environment, and Haggerty and Paliotta know this year's Olympians, with whom they train and practice in the summer, will represent their state and country well in Russia.

"You look at a state like Connecticut, not really known a while ago, being, I'm not sure you'd say, a hockey hotbed, but (it has) a lot of guys playing in the NHL," Paliotta said.